With the rapid development of economics and increasingly diversified market demands, users have been asking for better quality and performance of products, and meanwhile, also for shortening the production cycle time. Therefore, the production techniques have to be developed for meeting the requirements of more varieties, smaller lot size, and larger lot quantity, which satisfy the entire manufacture requirements merely with one cycle. The modern manufacturing techniques not only have to be highly flexible and be able to satisfy the quality and quantity requirements, but also have to own novel production modes capable of facing the fast market changes. It is perceivable that the future manufacturing system must be a flexible manufacturing system which can achieve the objectives of smart manufacturing, virtual manufacturing and quick response to customer's needs.
Since an IC fabrication involves complicated manufacturing steps, expensive processing equipments, numerous product varieties and short product life cycles, IC makers have to apply computer integrated manufacturing (CIM) procedures for properly utilizing all kinds of manufacturing resources by controlling material and information flows. The so-called CIM is centralized with a database system by means of computers, and then through a computer networking, passes the information stored in the database to users speedily, or integrates various automatic facilities into an integrated automatic production system. In January 1997, from an article in Semiconductor International Journal, it is reported that “the installation of a CIM system is mission-critical in the start-up of new fabs and in the on-going development of current ones”, wherein MES (Manufacturing Execution system) is the core of CIM.
A MES is a real-time online computer system integrating all kinds of information related to the production procedures, and the MES comprises the functions of: data collection; scheduling and inventory control; lot control; workflow control; tracking of work in process (WIP); equipment data management; recipe management; alarm and event management and maintenance management, etc. The MES can assist manufacturers (such as IC makers) to collect on-site data, and to convert the data into useful information for controlling and managing the production site, thereby achieving the goals of automatic management and maximum efficiency for a factory. Currently, there are several commercial MES brands used for monitoring a factory site. For example, those specialized in the application of IC factory are SiView made by IBM (International Business Machines) for specializing in the application of IC factory, and Factory Works made by Brooks Automation, etc. The functions of the aforementioned MESs covers the areas from collecting data, displaying information, analyzing information, to subscribing and generating reports, such as collecting equipment data (for example, material usage, equipment unit production and parameter settings, etc.); uploading/downloading process recipes; statistically calculating and reporting alarm messages; collecting process information and transmitting the information to an SPC (Statistical Process Control) system for performing a process status analysis; real-time monitoring current equipment situations (for example, working mode, pending mode, maintenance mode or shutdown mode, etc.); and simultaneously monitoring equipments of different model numbers, etc.
Referring to FIG. 1, FIG. 1 is a schematic diagram showing the operation of a conventional MES, wherein the MES 10 monitors a plurality of equipment managers 20, and each of the equipment managers monitors a plurality of equipments 30. The MES is responsible for executing most of the procedures, and also stores all the information to a system database 60. After an equipment manager 20 receives a command from the MES 10, the equipment manager then orders the equipments 30 to start making production. The MES 10 is also equipped with a web server 50, so that a remote client 40 can access the information through a web browser. However, since the software system of MES 10 is quite huge, and each of the equipment managers usually controls and monitors dozens or up to hundreds of equipments 30, the aforementioned MES 10, which is a centralized system used for executing most of the procedures and information, is very likely to cause the following shortcomings, wherein: execution speed would be slow down due to the MES traffic jam; certain procedures, such as lot control, cannot be executed until the information from all equipments 30 has been collected, received, and approved by the MES 10, and thus the report regarding the deficiency of each of the production cells is delayed and the necessary decisions for objectives cannot be made; the equipments 30 cannot be effectively monitored and managed from the remote ends, since the web server have been hooked up to the MES 10.
Referring to FIG. 2, FIG. 2 is a schematic diagram showing the relationship with regard to material flow (such as material in and product out) and information flow in the conventional MES, wherein, after all parameters and data are set in a MES 72, material 100 is inputted into a production cell 74 for manufacturing and outputting a product 102. Thereafter, major but simplified kinds of production information are sent to a quality inspection system 76 for performing the operation of quality control, and also displayed on a display element 70 (such as a bulletin board or displaying board). Because the information flow in the conventional MES architecture has to cross over multiple departments inside a factory, so that the operation of quality control must costs more extra effort, and further it is very ineffective for the onsite or direct personnel to obtain the information regarding the actual production efficiency. Besides, the conventional MES is hard to execute the activity-based production cost analysis/evaluation in shop floor. For executing such of cost analysis/evaluation, the information has to be collected first and then batch sent to a financial or accounting department inside the company for completing cost analysis/evaluation in period, that have failed to reflect the cost and efficacy of each of the production cells in time. Moreover, the objective-oriented indicators usually cannot be computed until the cost analysis/evaluation is completed. Hence, the manufacturing process cannot be improved in time, which has a considerable influence on the production capacity, yield, and cost, etc.
It is deserved to be mentioned that: for all kinds of industrial production modes have been developed toward the target of small quantity with many varieties, the related production techniques have also stressed on quick response to customer's needs and accurate delivery time, thereby wining orders and promoting competitiveness, and enabling the production capacity and process techniques to meet market demands. Therefore, it is necessary to resolve the aforementioned shortcomings of the conventional MES and its architecture as soon as possible.
Hence, there is a urgent need to develop a production cell information system and an architecture therefore, so as to overcome the disadvantages of the conventional MES and its architecture, and meanwhile to effectively satisfy the overall enterprise needs, such as financial reports, operation improvements, efficacy evaluation, inventory control, production planning, engineering design, order handling and customer relationship management, etc.